MTI Reaches ‘Next Level’ With Millers’ 50-Foot Beauty

No matter how many custom high-performance powerboats you complete, you’re only as good as your last one. It’s a  simple maxim, but one the best builders embrace, at least if long-term survival is among their goals. And MTI of Wentzville, Mo., which celebrated its 25th anniversary last year, is no exception.

Far from it, in fact, and company founder and owner Randy Scism wouldn’t have it any other way. Proof positive is the MTI V-50 center console that Performance Boat Center, the company’s dealer at the Lake of the Ozarks in Central Missouri, delivered last weekend to Tyler and Lindsey Miller of Monster Energy/M CON offshore racing team fame.

Ordered by Tyler and Lindsey Miller, the latest MTI-V 50 could well be the finest one built to date. Photos courtesy/copyright Performance Boat Center.

“It seems like all of our builds push us to the next level of custom boat-building,” said Scism. “And we love it that way. Tyler and Lindsey do everything as a couple and they wanted lots of added details like carbon fiber MTI inserts in the sole and a starlight headliner.

“It’s just priceless when you convert customers who’ve owned other brands, like Tyler and Lindsey have” he added. “It’s all about the process, or the ‘experience’ if you will. First they enjoy the build process, and then they get to enjoy their boat.”

Ready For Its Miami Close-Up
When a rare “hole” appeared in the MTI’s production schedule in 2022, the Millers immediately filled it with a center-console order. The 50-footer was close enough to completion by this February to steal the Miami International Boat Show, an impressive feat given that it was showcased next to the company’s sleek-and-sexy second-generation 48-foot stern-drive catamaran.

For all five days of the show, visitors from discerning powerboat fans to folks who had no idea what they were looking at—but still loved what they saw—flocked around the MTI exhibit.

Captured here with MTI principal Randy Scism (right), Tyler and Lindsey Miller saw their 50-foot center console for the first time at the Miami event.

“From the beginning, the project was a home run,” said Brett Manire, the co-owner of Performance Boat Center. “Randy Scism and his team took care of Tyler and Lindsey better than anybody could ever dream of. When the boat was ready for lake use, we found a buyer for their Cigarette 41 Nighthawk, I took that buyer’s 39-foot Cigarette on trade and the business side was done.”

“I told Tyler that I have been doing this for 24 years and I have sold a lot of cool boats,” he added. “But this one takes the cake. It is the coolest boat I have ever delivered.”

Joining The MTI Family
Though the Millers stick to catamarans of the Skater kind for their raceboats—currently of the Class 1 and Super Cat kind—they’ve owned high-performance pleasure-boats from other builders, as Scism noted. Their new 50-foot MTI center console powered by five Mercury Racing 500R engines defies comparison, according to Tyler Miler, who throttles both of his team’s offshore raceboats alongside driver Myrick Coil, to any of their previous rides.

“There is zero comparison,” he said. “It is the most well-put-together pleasure boat we’ve ever owned. And the build process? It was first-class.

“The delivery process with Performance Boat Center was the same, just first-class all the way,” he added. “They made it a pleasure. Randy and his team at MTI and Brett Manire and his team at Performance Boat Center were amazing.”

That Lindsey Miller offered ideas requiring changes that required changes didn’t faze the MTI team in the least, according to her husband and Scism. Though the couple complimented everyone involved, she saved her highest praise for the company’s Lacie Morrison and Wes Jones.

Lindsey Miller credited MTI vice-president Taylor Scism with playing a pivotal role in the project.

Detail after detail went into the Miller’s first MTI.

“Her knowledge and wisdom not only about the product but the build process is amazing.,” Miller explained. “And the care and concern Taylor and everyone at MTI has to make the finish product ‘fit’ the customer’s actual boating lifestyle is mind-blowing.”

Pressed to pick a “favorite feature” of the 50-footer, she struggled. “I have all kinds of favorites,” she said. “The cabin is tall enough for Tyler to stand up in. The marble flooring in the cabin is amazing. The carbon fiber MTI inserts are incredible. There’s just so much.”

A multi-time world and national champion offshore racer, Tyler Miller didn’t have to think long about what he likes best about the center console.

“The drivability of the 50 is unreal,” he said. “It has a soft, solid ride but when you turn the steering wheel it responds like an offshore raceboat. We ran our first-sea trail with 22 people on board and full tanks of fuel and it all felt so effortless.

“There’s nothing like the drivability of this boat,” he added. “Everything about it, from the build quality to the features to the performance, is insane.”

Where The Stainless Meets The Water
As it  happened, Manire and the Performance Boat Center crew delivered following last weekend’s Shootout Offshore at the Lake. Tyler Miller being Tyler Miller, he invited a slew of family and extended family—to the tune of 22 guests—on board for the afternoon. But in not-so Tyler Miller fashion, he was reluctant to get behind the wheel

“Like the boat, the delivery took the cake,” Manire said, then laughed. “I got to deliver with my fiancé, Kaitlyn, and my daughter, McKinley. Tyler started inviting pretty much everyone in the Redhead Lakeside Grill that including the SV Offshore Racing family and the entire Coil family.

Said Tyler MIller of his family’s new prize, ““It is the most well-put-together pleasure boat we’ve ever owned.”

“Tyler was nervous about it driving it, so I drove it to the first two stops,” he continued. “At the third stop I told him I was going to start drinking Fireball so he better be ready and able to drive. So Craig Amptmeyer, one his M CON crew guys, the SV Racing guys and I started doing shots of Fireball. Tyler was like, ‘Damn you Brett Manire, you’re making me driving this thing already. And I said, ‘It’s been three hours Tyler. You need to drive it.’”

Manire paused for a moment, a smile spreading across his face.

“Here was Tyler Miller, a multi-time world champion offshore powerboat racer, nervous about driving a new boat. That was humbling.”

Combine a builder who sweats the details, a dedicated dealer and a couple of committed center-console clients and this is the result.

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